Willow Smith Rocks A Tongue Ring: Would You Allow Your Child To Get One?

Vixen

Piercings have long been a source of contention between conservative idealists and rebellious spirits with a pension for outward expression. While ear piercings at a young age are accepted, and even considered the standard, piercings of the nose, chin, tongue, belly button and eyebrow are regarded as controversial and even shunned at times. That’s why it came as little surprise when critics lambasted 11 year-old Willow Smith for posing with a fake tongue ring on Monday of this week.

This is not the first time disparaging and incendiary comments have been made about Willow Smith. Her style of dress and extravagant hairstyles (from pink mohawks to a more recent yellow buzzcut) have been negatively assessed by many, who think it’s dangerous to give that much creative freedom to a person at a vulnerable stage in their lives.

Willow’s father, Will Smith, addressed naysayers, saying: “We let Willow cut her hair. When you have a little girl, it’s like how can you teach her that you’re in control of her body? If I teach her that I’m in charge of whether or not she can touch her hair, she’s going to replace me with some other man when she goes out in the world. She can’t cut my hair but that’s her hair. She has got to have command of her body. So when she goes out into the world, she’s going out with a command that it is hers. She is used to making those decisions herself. We try to keep giving them those decisions until they can hold the full weight of their lives.”